


womaniser

by sapphfics



Category: Barbie - All Media Types, Barbie and the Three Musketeers (2009)
Genre: Corinne has Daddy Issues, F/F, Polyamory, The Author Regrets Nothing, corinne dates the three musketeers and it’s gay, i love making barbie men irrelevant, uhh it gets vaguely nsfw so. There’s That
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-12
Updated: 2020-01-07
Packaged: 2020-06-26 08:52:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19764775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphfics/pseuds/sapphfics
Summary: There aren’t many things left of her father except his rusting weapons, so Corinne supposes that his insatiable love of women must have been passed down to her.Or: Corinne is more like her father than those who knew him would care to admit.





	1. ambitious

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the_glare_you_see](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_glare_you_see/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Three Musketeers Plus One](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19705543) by [the_glare_you_see](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_glare_you_see/pseuds/the_glare_you_see). 



> so! corinne’s father in this fic is based off of the original book, hence why he’s the absolute worst. if you wanna know more about him without committing yourself to reading that rubbish, you can watch [this video](https://youtu.be/MMR6VYe6sfY).
> 
> this fic is half “corinne has daddy issues and here’s why” and the other half is gay nonsense. enjoy!
> 
> (also it took every ounce of my self control not to name this fic after the song “daddy issues” by the neighborhood, but that song has been in too many gross het fanvids so. britney spears instead)

Corinne is nine years old when she learns that her father sometimes kills people for his coin. 

There are many things she does not know about her father, and many things she never learns. Perhaps that is for the best. 

There is a man who comes across her when she’s riding through the streets of Paris alone. Alexander is only a pony then, but stands tall and proud and is faster than any horse she has ever known. She need only click her heels together and she’d be home in no time.

Corinne isn’t afraid of him; she knows Paris well, and she knows not to speak to strangers. But the man’s eyes are kind. 

“Who are you?” He asks. 

“I am Corinne D’Artagnan,” She replies. 

“Your father must be Charles D’Artagnan, yes?” 

Corinne nods. “Do you know him? I’ll send him. You must be one of his friends, right?” 

“I’d hardly call us friends.” 

The man has yet to introduce himself but Corinne doesn’t find that strange. The three men who regularly visit her father do not pay her much attention at all. It’s a small miracle this one is deigning to speak to her. She supposes it would be different if she were a boy, or if she looked more like him. She has her mother’s wheat coloured hair, and her father’s eyes.  
“What do you mean?” 

“You’ll understand soon enough. Please, send for him.” He says solemnly. Corinne sees him glance towards his sword. She is about to turn away when he stops her in her tracks. “You know, I don’t live far away. Should he...try anything with you, you can come to me and be safe. I have children of my own - three sons, all grown now.”  
“I would never hurt my daughter.” A voice from behind them. Her father. He is enraged. “Get away from her. Who are you to accuse me of such things?” 

He pushes Corinne behind her, but does not tell her to run. Corinne has always wondered why he didn’t, why he allowed her to hear their conversation. 

The street has become deserted. 

“I am Sir Maxim de Winter,” The man replies. “You had my aunt executed some years ago. I demand to hear your excuse.” 

“Take it up with the King. I do not have to explain myself to one of her brood,” Her father says, simply. “She was a criminal. She did not deserve to live.”

“A criminal she might have been, but you men were just as bad, if not worse. Her husband hung her from a tree as a girl until she almost died, and then you cut her head off for what? The crime of not loving you? You are not the god you perceive yourself to be,” de Winter spits back. 

“Why do you care? She was not your sister, nor your daughter.”

“She was a living, breathing woman, and you murdered her. We didn’t even get to bury her. You stole even that from us. Thus, D’Artagnan, I challenge you to a duel on her behalf.” Maxim throws down his glove. 

“Very well.” Her father laughs. “Fear not, sir. I’m sure you’ll have a chance to say hello to Milady de Winter soon enough. Give her my regards.” 

“Father, no-“ Corinne starts, but he’s already turning away. All she can be is a witness. She is a child, and not strong enough to defend him yet, and even then she cannot protect him from the battle that eventually takes his life just a year later. “You don’t have to kill him.” 

“I’m going to kill him regardless.” 

That night, he leaves their home with his sword freshly sharpened and comes home again with it bloodied. The kind man is dead. Her mother smiles. 

Corinne attends Maxim’s funeral, standing at the back of the Church where no one else can see her, and makes sure that his family gets enough to eat. 

She never quite looks at her father the same way again. 

-:-

Corinne has always known that her mother was not the first love in her father’s life. 

Even before Maxim de Winter, there are at least seven more family members of her father’s jilted lovers trying similar tactics to him, her father moves she and her mother back to Gascony. Soon afterwards, he perishes in battle. Corinne should have been there with him. She isn’t. She is alive, and longing to return to Paris. She is not his son, but she will continue his legacy. She practises with one of her father’s old swords. She is going to be a Musketeer. 

And now, here she is. 

There aren’t many things left of her father except his rusting weapons, so Corinne supposes that his insatiable love of women must have been passed down to her. It makes sense. She must have her father’s mind if she does not possess his look. 

She decides to make the most it. 

When Prince Louis leaves her for some princess whose hands are as soft as goose feather pillows instead, Corinne hugs Aramina for a bit too long and smirks at him. In retaliation, he begins sending them on more dangerous mission. His crown has not made him wiser. 

A part of her wonders if Louis wants her dead, if he isn’t so different from his uncle after all. 

Ambitions change over time, don’t they? 

-:-

Aramina is the first. It turns out, she considers girls just as dreamy as boys, and Corinne has been a pipe dream to her until now. 

There’s quite a lot of time spent alone together on missions. 

The first time Corinne kills a man, it is to protect her, because sometimes Aramina’s fans can only do so much. She doesn’t have time to think about it before she puts her sword through the man’s eye. She feels nothing. She wonders if this is how her father felt when Maxim lay dead in front of him. 

She wonders if her father ever felt anything. 

Corinne turns. They were back to back during the fight, but now she has space to move again now no one is hunting them. 

Aramina’s hair has come loose during the fight, and it hangs loose around her face. The moon hangs low in the sky, half formed. Corinne needs to find a shovel, but right now all she can think about is how Amira somehow looks like a living fantasy at all hours of the day. 

“Are you alright, Corinne?”

“But I do love thee,” Corinne recites. “And when I love thee not…”

“Chaos come again,” Aramina finishes, and kisses her. Corinne feels lighter. “I like chaos, and I like you. Why do you think I invited you to stay with us? To stay with me?

Corinne kisses her back. “I’ll always stay with you, as long as I’m alive.” 

Aramina smiles, then goes to find a shovel. They will need to get rid of the bodies. 

Corinne’s new ambition is to find love wherever she can.


	2. honest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Renée likes to play her violin in the evenings often, and it helps Corinne fall asleep. It’s a soft tune, simple, like a lullaby. 
> 
> But tonight, there is no violin playing. Renée is not here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **warnings:** mild/referenced gore/torture & injury, mild/referenced sexual content

Corinne is no fool. She knows that her father was not always an honest man.

She supposes this fact came with his occupation. You could hardly be a musketeer and be an honest man, not with the blood on your hands and the knowledge of what truly happens behind closed palace doors. Corinne knows some of this too, from the numerous times that Louis had invited her into his bed and whispered secrets to her in payment. She eavesdrops on the other servants, on Madame de Bossé, on the other aristocrats she now knows. The things they speak of would turn her blood cold if she were anyone else. 

But is Corinne D'Artagnan and almost nothing makes her cry. 

She knows this much; her father loved her. Or at the very least, he must have thought he did. She remembers him holding her one last time before he left for that damned battle, telling her “when I come home, we’ll be rich as the king.” And of course, he never came back. 

She doesn’t plan to do the same. She knows her mother wants grandchildren but she doesn’t. She doesn’t want a husband. She is a musketeer; she will guard the royal family until the second she dies. 

Even Hélène seems surprised by this when she expresses this, when she tells her of what exactly happened with Louis. 

“You aren’t the only girl in this castle to have had a brief fling with royalty,” Hélène tells her. “I was young and stupid once; he was a baron who was held in high regard. When he got bored of me, I could have ripped his beating heart from his chest and eaten it before his eyes.” 

“I mean — I don’t hate him,” Corinne says. “But I don’t miss him either.”

At this remark, Aramina sends her a pointed glance across the training hall. They still train in secret, despite everything, because Louis might have made them musketeers but some men go mad with rage when a woman infiltrates their group. 

Beside her, Renée uses one of the training swords and knocks Corinne’s feet out from under her. It’s so unexpected that Corinne finds herself laughing.

“That was payback for the fountain, darling,” Renée tells her and then smiles. “You need to get your mind off of Louis. Now, en garde?”

Renée isn’t wrong, so Corinne raises her sword in return. 

Renée wins. Corinne doesn’t mind. 

-:-

Renée likes to play her violin in the evenings often, and it helps Corinne fall asleep. It’s a soft tune, simple, like a lullaby. 

They’re still in that same room from when they were poorly paid servants. Louis had offered Corinne her own quarters near his bedchamber, but she had refused, not wanting to leave her friends. 

And they are still friends, even though Aramina is now more than that. 

It’s winter now and all of them have moved their beds together to share body heat. It’s too expensive to light the fire all night but they get by fine. Besides, Corinne hates the loneliness of sleeping alone the way she was often forced to when Louis left her in the mornings. And he always, always left. 

It makes her wonder why she could ever believe he would stay with her. Was she so desperate? 

She’s not desperate anymore. 

Aramina cuddles into her shoulder, her soft auburn hair flowing down Corinne’s nightshirt. Miette is curled up on Corinne’s feet. 

But tonight, there is no violin playing. Renée is not here. 

Just as the sun is beginning to rise, Corinne watches Renée stumble into their shared quarters with bandaged hands. The door to their quarters slams shut behind her and Renée falls to the ground. 

“Renée!” Corinne whispers in alarm, rushing over to help her up. “What happened? Were you attacked on the way home?”

“I was—I was on a mission,” Renée replies. “It was going wrong, really wrong. He held me down and cut my knuckles, but I cut right through his neck.” 

“Louis didn’t tell me—“

“Louis didn’t tell you a lot of things,” Renée remarks. “But that’s not your fault, it’s his. Don’t worry about me, Corinne.” 

“I worry about all of you,” Corinne states. “All the time. I will never stop. When you didn’t come home I thought—”

“Louis tried to kiss me,” Renée hisses angrily. “He’s getting married next week to a Princess and he tried to kiss me! Trying to get back at you, I think. But I knocked out one of his shiny teeth.”

“I’m so sorry,” Corinne says and Renée finally sits down on the edge of Corinne’s far too large bed, her bloodied hands in her lap. “Are you going to tell his fiancé? I’ll back you up.”

“She’s very pretty,” Renée says. “And deserves better. I’ll tell her if I can get her alone. Will she believe me, though?”

“You aren’t his jilted ex lover,” Corinne reminds her. “You have no motive to lie. She’ll believe you.” 

“I’m glad you believe me,” Renée says, and moves her face a bit closer to Corinne’s, but pulls back. “Goodnight.” 

Renée sighs and relaxes into Corinne’s soft sheets, finally letting herself sleep, her violin forgotten. 

-:-

“Renée wanted to kiss you, you fool!” Aramina announces whilst Renée is bathing. “I could see it, I was awake!” 

“What? You’re never awake on time,” Corinne says. “Anyway, I’m with you now so—“

“Corinne, darling, I don’t mind,” Aramina says. “If you wanted to kiss her, I mean. She’s very beautiful, brave and kind. What did you think we were doing living alone without men together for two years before you came along? Cleaning? I miss those days, sometimes, Renée took me on the most wonderful dates to orchestras and Vivica would have me try on new fashions just so she could rip them—” 

“Wait—dates?” Corinne repeats. “All three of you? Together?”

Aramina blinks, her pretty eyelashes getting caught. “Of course? Nothing else made sense but them. All for one and all that, all’s fair in love and war, right?” 

That isn’t what I meant, Corinne considers, but I can work with it. 

-:-

“You want to kiss me, don’t you?” Corinne says, slyly. “Aramina said.”

“She’s more perceptive than she lets on,” Renée remarks. “But she’s right. I did want to kiss you, and I’m sorry, you’re with Aramina and I ruined it—“

“You didn’t ruin anything Renée,” Corinne says. “Aramina’s also told me about your dates. I’d like to take you to an orchestra, if that’s alright? I’ve got connections.” 

Renée grins. “In that case, I accept your offer.” 

Corinne takes her that same night. 

The theatre is packed but they manage to get a private box; a privilege that comes with being two famous female musketeers. 

Privately, Corinne thinks that Renée could play better than this orchestra with her eyes shut, but she will tell Renée later. 

“I like you a lot,” Corinne says, and it is honest, and Renée grins. 

“I like you a lot, too.” Renée replies. 

Renée’s hands are healing well, and Corinne feels the soft bandages press against the back of her neck when Renée kisses her in a private box whilst the orchestra drowns out any other noise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you enjoyed part two <3333
> 
> hope you enjoyed this!!!
> 
> come talk to me on [tumblr](https://sapphfics.tumblr.com/) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/sapphfics) if you feel so inclined! let’s be friends <333


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